Restlessness

Apparently something not well known is that quitting can cause serious bouts of restlessness. This has become a major issue for me over the last 3 nights. At first I thought it might be the anxiety or increased emotion causing my inability to sleep, but after a bit of research I found that it tends to simply be a side effect of nicotine withdrawal, one that can last up to three months. So now that the days are going pretty smoothly the nights are almost unbearable.

If you've ever been sleep deprived you know what this can do to a person's body. I'm starting to feel light-headed, nauseous, heavy-eyed, and cranky. This pretty much sucks.

I'm looking forward to a nice (and hopefully relaxing) weekend at the lake though, there couldn't be a better time for a long weekend. I need it, we both do. I can't wait to sit on the pier and read or cross-stitch for 4 days next to the most wonderful man I've ever known. Thank God. On a sad note this blog will most likely go untouched until next Tuesday, have a fantastic holiday!

Day 4 - Inspiration

Today's Inspiration: When I wake up on a lazy Sunday morning I really want to be able to stay in bed and enjoy it for a while.

Finding ways to stay busy

So yesterday was a fantastic day for me. I've learned that the key for me is staying busy, I mean really really busy. Just watching TV or a movie doesn't work. My hands AND my brain need to be occupied at all times. I'm a busy bee normally, so the increase in energy combined with this new found love of constantly doing something excites me. There is a world of crafts and all kinds of whatnot I have never even delved into. YAY!

After a great day at work I decided to stop at the craft store. This can be a very dangerous thing for me, so I took a friend. I have found it imperative that I use the buddy system at the craft store, not that I don't absolutely love what I come home with (usually cake tools), but my wallet generally isn't too happy with me afterwards, good thing I'm going to have an extra $150 in spending money each month now!!!

After spending nearly an hour in the craft store I decided on cross-stitch. I've attempted this before, but last time I chose an "easy" design. This time I was feeling adventurous and went all out with a difficult one (picture below). Once I got it home and out of the package I realized that this should keep me occupied for a good long while.

Day 3 – Inspiration

Today's Inspiration: When I am feeling emotional or angry I want it to be because of something in my life, not because of a foreign object's control.

60 Hours and counting

Cry
-verb (used without object)
To utter inarticulate sounds, esp. of lamentation, grief, or suffering, usually with tears.

This became an important definition for me last night. The day went well, no real problems. The cravings were there, but I found ways to manage them and distract myself. After work, Nick and I went out for the first time together since the quit, and unfortunately the night didn’t go as well as I had hoped.

Nick’s softball team suffered an unfortunate loss during which I was really lucky to have a friend close by to talk to. I know that to a non-smoker a softball game seems rather harmless, but it’s quite the opposite; it’s stressful wanting your team to win so badly and being outside where you know that, if you wanted to, you could “light-up”. We both made it through the softball game unscathed, but we are dealing with the quit in very different ways, and the tension was starting to rise a bit.

Since an argument was what caused our quit to fail the last 2 times I decided to try to make light of the situation and on the way to dinner we managed to have quite a laugh together over a purple envelope. I realize I will not be able to explain it so I won’t try, but it still makes me smile. It was nice to release in that way; to be really happy just sitting next to each other laughing. Dinner went well, but it was the heaviest meal I’d consumed since Monday and gave me a pretty strong urge.

The car ride home is where it started. I won’t get into the details of it here as I’d like it to remain personal, and quite frankly I just don’t want to talk about it, but the tension broke. Nick and I got into it… pretty badly. I can only speak for myself when I say this, but the pressure and the emotion got away from me. To be honest I don’t even remember much of why we were arguing. Silly things mostly, it was the nicotine talking. After he dropped me off at home I cried. I cried and cried and cried some more, I wanted to smoke SO badly, but I didn’t. Instead I picked up the phone and called a friend. One of the greatest friends I have, this friend left their friends and the bar they were at just to spend a half an hour talking to me and calming me down.

After Nick and I both calmed down a bit we talked, both apologized and accepted the fact that we were both equally at fault for the blow-out and I cried some more. One thing I learned last night after all the crying and after reading the definition that began this post, it's okay to admit that I'm suffering. This is a difficult journey and I don't have to pretend like it's not. I'm strong for getting through it and committing to it, it's okay to be honest about it.

Although Nick may be going through this in different ways, he showed me last night that I'm not going through it alone. I honestly wish I could put into words how much I love him, but I don’t think that’s even possible. He is my rock and we WILL get through this together, for our future. Going forward, now that we understand the different ways we are dealing with this, we will lean on each other. I’m not kidding myself and thinking we won’t argue again during this process, but at least now we’ll be able to recognize it as the nicotine and not our relationship that’s volatile.

Points of Inspiration

As I sit here this morning, starting to feel the effects of withdrawal, it occurs to me just how many reasons I have for quitting. I feel it's a good idea for me to start posting a point of inspiration daily. It should be one more thing to keep me focused, keep me thinking, and maybe even inspire others like me to begin this difficult but rewarding journey as well.

Today's Inspiration: I'd love to be able to sit through a sporting event, movie, or play without becoming antsy or feeling the need to run out the door as soon as it's over.

Day One - Complete

As I find myself ready to call it a night a calm seems to have come over me for today. It was quite a day, but in the end I am nothing but happy that I made it and have put this one behind me.

Why was it quite a day you ask? Well, let's start at the beginning. I woke up first at nearly 5am to yet another terrible nightmare (in case you don't know me well I suffer from terrible reoccurring night terrors) luckily this one was not bad enough to cause serious injury, so I guess that goes on the plus side. Normally this would cause me to go out for a smoke, but I resisted the urge and fought my way back to sleep on my own.

I finally got out of bed around 7:30 and did all the usual morning stuff. I've never been one to smoke before leaving the house, so this went pretty smoothly... until I went to walk out the door and couldn't find a shoe. No, not shoes... ONE shoe. The same shoes I wear to work almost everyday and one is missing. How does that happen?! So I tear the house apart to no avail and finally go to work in flip-flops... ugh. My urges were raging at this point from the frustration, so I asked my roommate/coworker to drive today since I can't smoke in her car. Excellent choice. By 10 minutes into the drive I was nice and clam again.

Once at work things went pretty smoothly. I found that drinking through a straw helps greatly and didn't really have a craving at all... until I got the call... my roommate/coworker had gotten ill and I would be spending my lunch in the car, by far the most difficult place for me to be, but I love her and would do anything for her so off we went.

Once back at work I was doing okay, proud of myself for getting through an hour in the car and on a bit of a high, right up until my entire system crashed. 3:30 in the afternoon and my computer decides "hey.. screw you... I don't want to work anymore today" so here I am with things to do and a blank frozen screen. While waiting for the computer to do it's thing and reboot and whatnot the boredom finally sets in, having nothing to do is another HUGE trigger for me so I decided to get up and do a lap around the warehouse. To my surprise it worked perfectly, by the time I got back to my desk the computer was back up and the urge was gone. YAY!

I'm now seated comfortably at my desk working again and someone runs in the building yelling "WINDOWS ARE DOWN OUT THERE AND IT'S POURING". At first I think nothing of it because I never leave my windows down when my car is parked, I don't want bugs in there, but then all of a sudden I realize this day is different... this day I decided to air out any remaining smoke that might be in the car. In a panic I ran out to the car just in time to find it soaked, to the bone.

Feeling defeated I returned to my desk, only to have my best idea yet, start a blog! That got me through the rest of my work day free and clear. Nick (my boyfriend who's also quitting) stayed on the phone with me the whole drive home which I think helped us both greatly. Physical Therapy went well, I had a healthy dinner and now here I am, successfully through my day and blogging once more, officially 24 hours free of nicotine and proud of myself and of Nick. I can't wait to see him tomorrow after what I hope is a tiny bit smoother day :-)



 

*Update* - Last night, after this post but shortly before going to bed, I found the shoe... RIGHT NEXT to the other one. In fairness it was upside-down, but I guess my brain really is starting to play tricks on me ;-)